


Just the Same

by EmilyLouise



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Angst, Aziraphale Has Self-Esteem Issues (Good Omens), Body Image, Crowley Has Self-Esteem Issues (Good Omens), Established Relationship, F/F, Giant sloths, Good Omens Big Bang, Healthy Relationships, Hurt/Comfort, Lesbians, M/M, Plant abuse, Unhealthy Relationships
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-04
Updated: 2020-02-04
Packaged: 2021-02-27 12:21:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,169
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22336948
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EmilyLouise/pseuds/EmilyLouise
Summary: So, the world didn't end and everything's pretty much the same, really. Apart from Aziraphale and Crowley are now in some sort of romantic relationship that neither of them knows how to navigate. But they don't need to talk about it or make it a thing. It's fine, really, apart from the times it isn't.Things that were researched for this fic: Victorian and Georgian nightwear, the play 'Romeo and Juliet', molluscs, Aziraphale's conservation practices, the menu at the British Museum, the layout of the V&A, Italian renaissance gardens, Giant Sloths, plant varieties, the guardian crossword, compost, and the difference between BP and BC.
Relationships: Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens), OFC/OFC
Comments: 6
Kudos: 88
Collections: Good Omens Big Bang 2019





	Just the Same

**Author's Note:**

> A huge thank you to my artist, [Squashbee](https://squashbee.tumblr.com), who found something worth illustrating in this, and did it so beautifully! 
> 
> A huge thank you to my beta, inflappable, who made my ramblings into cohesive English sentences. 
> 
> And finally, a thank you to Ashlynn who makes it so damn easy to write about being in love and how to make a happy fulfilling life together: I love you.

_'Summer comes, winter fades,_

_Here we were just the same,_

_Don't need pressure, don't need change,_

_Let's not give the game away_

_There used to be an empty space,_

_A photograph without a face,_

_But with your presence and your grace,_

_Everything falls into place'_

Gabrielle Aplin - Please Don't Say You Love Me 

  
  


The dolphins were fine. The dolphins, the whales and the gorillas were all fine and good and got to go about their lives as if nothing ever happened. Same for nearly every single human being on Earth, same even for Aziraphale's books which, despite a few new additions, were the same as they had always been. The world had nearly ended and yet... 

Everything was just the same. 

Well, nearly everything. 

Aziraphale and Crowley; there was something a little different there. There was something there that was forever changed. They were changed, their worlds had changed, and suddenly this nameless thing between them had changed. 

It was still nameless. They didn’t need to pressure it with names and roles and expectations. They could be the same as they were before, just more. 

Closer, warmer, perhaps, but fundamentally the same. 

*

It was still a rare thing that Crowley got to see Aziraphale quite like this. The thing between them was still relatively new, and there were things that Crowley was now privy to that he could not stop being grateful for witnessing. 

Aziraphale had never been as enamoured with sleeping as Crowley was, but he had recently rather taken to it. He laid there in his striped pyjamas and honest-to-G—, honest-to-someone, matching sleeping cap like it was the 1820s and he had to keep his head warm from a winter chill. Crowley knew that Aziraphale did not miracle clothes into existence; everything he owned was the genuine article and meticulously cared for. Which made the whole ensemble both more ridiculous and, as much as Crowley loathed to admit it, endearing. 

Although, Crowley mused, he should just be pleasantly surprised that Aziraphale wasn’t wearing some sort of ankle-length Georgian nightgown. 

The ridiculous cap had slid up Aziraphale's head, leaving the shocking blond hair peeking out, and Aziraphale was dead to the world, his mouth opened rather unattractively in a way that should have left him drooling, if he were aware that was a thing humans could and should do when their mouth was so widely agape. 

Crowley can see a pink tongue and the glint of pearly white teeth, and the vulnerability of it all makes something ache within him. He looked at ethereal being in front of him and knew that there wasn’t anything on this or any other planet that he’d deny him. Aziraphale’s eyes moved underneath the paper-thin skin of his eyelids and his eyelashes fluttered with the movement, and Crowley thought of how he would destroy all the stars he put in the sky—rip them straight down with his bare hands—if Aziraphale looked at him imploringly enough.

This was exactly the kind of unquestioning Love he reckoned he should have had for Her but couldn't stop himself questioning. And yet here he was, willing to give it to someone who referred to Vera Lyn as modern music. 

It was a terrifying thought, but he just had to trust that Aziraphale wouldn't abuse this power. Crowley would like to think that Aziraphale was as innocent as he looked gently snoozing, but he knew he wasn't. He could and had lied straight to Crowley’s face—and the bastard was bold enough to lie straight to Her face—so Crowley knows he cannot blindly trust him. 

He can’t help but think about when he asked Aziraphale for holy water and how, if their positions had been reversed, he’d have done it unquestioningly. He cannot completely trust that Aziraphale won’t ask for something that would destroy Crowley, and Crowley could not trust himself not to do it. 

Aziraphale makes a little noise in his sleep and Crowley knows, as sure that he knew that Eve ate the apple, that he would do it. 

Anything Aziraphale asked. 

He was stirred from his thoughts as Aziraphale, one eye open and eyeing Crowley suspiciously, asks, “Were you—Were you watching me sleep?”

“Er, what? No, don’t be soft.” Crowley scoffs, red around the tips of ears from the embarrassment. Aziraphale says nothing in return but gives Crowley a wide, smug grin in response that says, “I don’t believe you, but I don’t mind at all that you were,” and Crowley can’t help but smile back, all his gloomy thoughts of love-induced self-destruction gone. 

"Crowley, dear?" Aziraphale says in the long, careful, questioning way that Crowley knows is going to be followed by a request. 

"Yes, angel?" Crowley replies indulgently.

"Could you possibly, dear boy, bring me a cup of tea?" Aziraphale asks in such a polite and innocent way that he could almost fool someone into thinking that he really believed Crowley might say no. 

Crowley knows better than that and sighs as if he has been greatly put-upon. "Well, aren’t you going to at least make it worth my while?" he asks with faux impatience. 

Aziraphale smiles “Oh, of course, my dear. How remiss of me," and he kisses Crowley softly on the cheek. 

"That's better," Crowley says as he slowly saunters out of bed, shrugging on his pyjama shirt and making his way towards the kitchen. He could have miracled up the cup of tea, but Aziraphale preferred it done properly. 

*

They didn’t get to choose their corporations, but Crowley had few problems with his. Okay, the snake eyes were a little bit awkward sometimes, but he looked pretty fucking cool in sunglasses so it was swings and roundabouts really. Sometimes he preferred how his body looked in a dress and sometimes in trousers. Quite often he didn’t care, but it had generally been much easier navigating life while presenting as vaguely male, so that had been his choice more often than not. But he liked to mix it up now and then. New hair, new clothes, new glasses. 

Aziraphale, however, had remained steadfastly Aziraphale for 6000 years and hadn't changed so much as his haircut in that time. There were periods when wigs were in fashion, which Aziraphle had taken up with gusto, and he had delighted in the colours and scents of the wig powders, rather favouring the blue. He would begrudgingly change his clothes as the ones he loved and steadfastly took care of became so out of fashion as to be a nuisance. He had, as long as these concepts had existed, given off a sort of posh gay elder vibe in both his words and his actions that his sartorial choices and body matched beautifully. 

It was welcoming and soft and soft-skinned, and Crowley loved it. 

Sure, he'd like it no matter what Aziraphale looked like. He was still unmistakably Aziraphale when he had shared a body with a red-haired sex worker- _cum_ -medium and honestly? He still would have still gotten “it” because it was Aziraphale. And yet, Crowley has seen all types of people, different heights, ages, shapes and sizes, and he's seen all kinds of the above configurations fall in and out of fashion. Aziraphale, as he had always been, ticks all of Crowley's boxes. 

Somewhere, on the best thing the humans had ever invented—the internet—Crowley had seen a [meme](https://images.app.goo.gl/e773WTtQbKNP7cus6): “world hard and cold, tiddy soft and warm”, and that was—as the kids say—‘a big mood’ (another phrase he had learned from the internet). Occasionally, when he curled up with Aziraphale around him, he had the unbidden thought of “world hard and cold, Aziraphale soft and warm”. There was nothing on this planet, or any other, like being able to rest his head on Aziraphale’s warm, soft but sturdy chest, the rhythmic beat of a heart that doesn’t have to drumming beneath his ear, Aziraphale’s strong arms around him. 

He’s got this lovely, warm, sunny smile, and that makes Crowley think, of all the awful plays, of Romeo and Juliet. Where he sees her for the first time and says, "O, she doth teach the torches to burn bright." If it didn’t pre-date Hamlet, Crowley would have thought Aziraphale’s grin while telling Hamlet to “buck up” would have been Shakespeare’s inspiration for that particular line. 

Perhaps, Crowley thinks, it was an apt play—star-crossed lovers and all that. Two households, both alike in dignity, _something something_ , from ancient grudge break to new mutiny, _ex Cetera_ … though thanks to Crowley and Aziraphale, their drama culminated in a far lower body count, even including a near Armageddon. 

He still preferred the funny ones. 

*

The kissing still felt new. It's been a few months now, but the novelty has not worn off. Crowley had been wanting to do this for 6000 years; it may take another 6000 before he’ll be used to it. Aziraphale had already shucked his jacket and waistcoat and was already in only his shirt, with sleeves rolled up to the elbow. Crowley felt like a Victorian gentleman seeing a flash of ankle for all the feeling it brought out in him. Aziraphale’s arms were strong and lightly dusted with blonde hair, culminating in the strong, square, but always butter-soft hands.

Crowley decides he may be overdressed and pauses the kiss to take off his blazer. Aziraphale looks at him coyly and asks, "Maybe the vest too?" 

Crowley grins. This was getting into exciting new territory, and he was more than happy to oblige. He could miracle the vest off, but he knew Aziraphale liked things to be done properly, so he undid the buttons as slowly as he could bring himself to, teasing but desperate himself, and flung it to the other side of the room—you know, for the added drama of it hitting the floor with a thwack. 

Aziraphale scowls. “Oh, really dear...,” he begins before Crowley silences him with a kiss. He puts his fingers to the buttons of Aziraphale’s shirt and pulls away to look at Aziraphale, tilting his head in a silent question: “May I?”. Aziraphale started to stutter a little, and Crowley immediately removed his fingers from the buttons. 

“What’s up?” Crowley asks, concerned he’d done something wrong. He’d gone too fast, he was always going too fast… 

“Oh, it’s nothing really…” Aziraphale demurs with an anxious edge to his voice, which clearly meant that something was up. For all his practice hiding the arrangement from the higher-ups, Aziraphale could be a damn poor liar. It didn’t cross Crowley’s mind that if Aziraphale really didn’t want him to know something, Crowley wouldn’t even have a suspicion. It really didn’t. 

“Aziraphale…” Crowley implores. He needed to know that Aziraphale could and would tell him the truth, even if the truth was “I’m not comfortable talking about that subject right now.” 

“It’s just—oh, it’s silly…” Aziraphale demurs again, starting to fret. 

Crowley raises an unimpressed, impatient eyebrow. 

“Well, it’s just—” Aziraphale trails off again, and Crowley raises his eyebrow higher. He knew his forehead was wrinkling rather unattractively, but a point needed to be made. "Well, it's just...I really shouldn't have let it upset me, but a few weeks, well I suppose it was months ago now..." 

“Get on with it, angel!” 

"Well, it's just that—you remember Gabriel?” Aziraphale asked fretting with the hem of his shirt. 

“Do I remember… of course I bloody remember Gabriel!” Crowley exclaimed, eyes wide. “Just spit it out, angel!”

“Well, he said something—something about my weight. My stomach, to be precise, and well maybe he's right and I just…” Aziraphale had gone red but managed to pull himself up straight and put on his most dignified voice. There’s such a vulnerability beneath it all that it made Crowley ache. He hated this soft kind of emotion; it seemed to rub the wrong way against the tender parts of him. He decided it was best for both of them to not let Aziraphale continue. 

“Well, no, he's not right. He's a fucking idiot. And who cares if he doesn’t like how you look? It's his loss.” 

“But you do, I suppose?” Aziraphale asks carefully. 

Crowley scrunches his brow and makes a questioning noise in his throat before realising what Aziraphale meant. 

“Is that? Were you? I mean…really, angel?” Crowley stops and looks at Aziraphale over the top of his dark glasses, looking straight into Aziraphale's eyes, hoping he could see how earnest Crowley was about what he said next. “I have found you painfully attractive since the day I first saw you.”

It was true. He had harboured a slightly pathetic crush on Aziraphale since he had first spied him, flaming sword aloft. Every interaction since had made everything worse until one day Aziraphale had fled a Bentley, leaving Crowley with a tartan flask and the knowledge he could now never un-know: that Aziraphale was it. Crowley knew he would always always _always_ want Aziraphale, and Aziraphale would never never _never_ want him back. 

He’d known then that Aziraphale had his heart forever. It may have been unnoticed and unwanted, but it was forever Aziraphale’s. 

Forever and ever, amen. 

“Oh, really?” Aziraphale asks in a voice that sounded more relieved than questioning. It makes Crowley think of being atop the garden walls of Eden and Aziraphale being relieved by the absolution of wrongdoing from a demon. 

God, Lucifer, all the angels above and below. Crowley loved him. 

“Would I lie to you?” he asks softly. He tries not to think of the last time he asked that. (“Well, obviously. You're a demon. That's what you do.”) Things had changed now. They needed to. 

Aziraphale regards him with a strange look on his face and says in a soft voice Crowley couldn’t read, “No, no you wouldn’t.” 

“Well, then, that’s settled. Shall we?” Crowley asks with a tempting smirk. 

Aziraphale nods, his shoulders set defiantly. 

Crowley’s fingers went back to Aziraphale’s shirt buttons, and he undoes them, trying his best to be patient, not going too fast and not damaging any original Victorian buttons. He kisses at the skin that he exposes, the hollow of Aziraphale’s neck. He pulls back and notices a sparse tuft of blond hair on the angel’s chest. 

“Chest hair?” Crowley asks. He hadn’t expected Aziraphale to make _that_ kind of Effort. 

“Oh, well I noticed that that’s how you prefer to present, and I thought you might like it. I could get rid of it if you don’t.” 

“No, no I like it. I just hadn’t expected it.”

He continues to unbutton the shirt, and just the sight of him there, buttons undone, sleeves rolled up the elbow, is enough to make Crowley feel a little dry-mouthed. 

He kisses Aziraphale’s chest and wondered, not for the first time, how someone unforgivable as himself had been able to have something as wonderful as this. As Aziraphale. 

*

They spend most of their time in Aziraphale’s bookshop. crowded and dusty as it is, it’s probably Crowley’s favourite place, but he supposed there was no point keeping a flat if they didn’t go there every now and then. Aziraphale looked at odds with the clean, dark lines of the Mayfair flat, but there was something quite pleasing about seeing him there amongst Crowley’s sparse possessions. Even if he did insist on poking around in every drawer Crowley owned. 

“Crowley, my dear, is this an oyster shell?” Aziraphale asks, looking at the distinctly oyster shell-shaped object in his delicately manicured hands. 

“What, that oyster shell you’re holding? Yeah, angel, it is.” 

Aziraphale fixes him with a glare. “Why on Earth have you got an oyster shell in your desk drawer?”

“Souvenir,” Crowley replies curtly, taking out his phone, suddenly very interested in something on it.

“A souvenir from what exactly, dear?”

“Rome,” Crowley says, an expression of feigned nonchalance on his reddening face. 

Aziraphale’s eyebrows rise in surprise. "They're not from Petronius' restaurant, are they?"

"Where else do you think I'd have gotten a sentimental oyster shell in Rome?” Crowley asks, testily. 

"Sentimental?" Aziraphale asks, and Crowley is finding it hard to tell if Aziraphale is genuinely touched or being a smug bastard, so he proceeds with caution. 

"Well, you know—a man's first oyster. It's a memorable occasion.” 

"It's kept remarkably well considering its age. Must be what? 1977 years old?"

"Yeah, why wouldn't it keep well?” Crowley asks, as if it weren't a literally ancient object. 

“These sorts of things normally require preservation and conservation, my dear.”

That sort of thing hadn’t ever crossed Crowley’s mind.

While Aziraphale liked to think he knew a thing or two about historic preservation—and he did, in fact, know a thing or two—most of his precious books were kept intact by the pure faith that they should be perfectly intact. It was this dichotomy that led to the original scroll of St. John the Divine of Patmos' “Revelation” being stored in a climate-controlled cabinet. Yet when handling the _Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter, Witch_ , Aziraphale had no book cushion, no spine support, and was wearing gloves that went against so many preservation guidelines. 

"Where do you put all your souvenirs, anyway, angel?” Crowley asks, trying to distract Aziraphale from his sentimental memento keeping. He'd so far managed to avoid a conversation about his statues, and this seemed like exactly the kind of conversation that would lead to questions about them if he didn’t steer it away. “There must be a drawer or a shelf somewhere in that bookshop filled to the brim with novelty pens, themed-baubles and other museum shop tat alone.” 

Nearly every time the two of them had covertly met in a museum, Crowley hadn’t been able to help himself from buying Aziraphale something absolutely terrible from the museum’s gift shop. Aziraphale would be touched and horrified in equal measure every time, which was exactly the mix of emotions Crowley aimed to invoke. 

"Hmm yes. I have all your little erm...gifts from our trips to museums somewhere, my dear." 

“Oh, really? I’ve not seen them anywhere, now I think about it.” 

“Oh, they’re somewhere safe. Very safe.”

“Hmmm,” Crowley hums, unconvinced. “C’mon angel. Stop handling mollusc shells and pick out what wine you’d like.”

* 

"Oh, really, my dear. I don’t think this is my good side,” Aziraphale says forlornly as he appraises the selfie critically. The light from the autumn sunset in St. James’s Park was just beautiful and Aziraphale looked beautiful in it, and Aziraphale was making capturing the moment together much more difficult than it really needed to be.

“What? All your sides are good sides.” Crowley hadn’t seen anything wrong with the first four photos, but trust Aziraphale to be so fussy.

“Oh, Crowley,” he says in a voice so love-stricken it takes Crowley slightly aback. Which means he was definitely not prepared for when the tenderest kiss ever to befall a person landed on his cheek. "You are sweet, dear.”

"No, I’m not," Crowley responds, a little red and a little dazed from being treated so tenderly—though not dazed enough to miss adding "You're just hot,” knowing it’d make Aziraphale blush. It worked. 

Cheeks still red but eyes soft with happiness, Aziraphale tries to school his features into something more proper and asks primly, “Shall we try again?” 

Crowley moves back next to Aziraphale so they were shoulder to shoulder and leans his head towards Aziraphale. “Maybe we should swap sides?” Aziraphale suggests. 

“No, I need to be on this side. This is my good side.”

“All your sides are good.”

“Yeah, very sweet and everything, angel, but I mean with me it's gotta be the side with the snake, right? Otherwise, what's the point?" 

"Hmm. Maybe I should get a face marking to signify my good side. A tattoo maybe," Aziraphale says, so seriously that Crowley made a little choking noise in his throat. 

"Oh, you bastard," he says fondly to Aziraphale, whose feigned innocence didn’t quite disguise his glee. “Right, come on. We’re getting this selfie if it kills us.” 

“Kills us!?”

“Inconveniently discorpates us, then!” 

*

There was a lot of new stuff they did together now, but a lot of it was just the same as always. They still go to the British Museum, although the cafe was no longer a secret rendezvous spot. But the food was still good, and Aziraphale had the carrot, walnut and blossom honey cake, still put out that they'd stopped serving deviled eggs. He always enjoyed them as a small act of rebellion. Perfectly seasoned rebellion. 

Crowley liked the sound of the smoked almonds and shared his order with Aziraphale. They visited the same exhibitions they had always visited. They had the exact same reminiscence of when the Parthenon marbles were actually on the Parthenon and of the frankly ridiculous walk up the Acropolis in 30-degree weather. Aziraphale would want to casually stroll around the Enlightenment rooms, as he just liked the atmosphere of them, and Crowley would indulge him. Crowley would find the ugliest souvenir in the whole gift shop and gift it to Aziraphale, who would—unconvincingly—act happily surprised. 

On this particular visit, Crowley treated Aziraphale to lip balm in the shape of a sphinx rubber duck.

"It's lip balm," he says as he hands it to Aziraphale, smacking his lips obnoxiously. 

“Oh, how lovely. Thank you, dear." 

After a last look around the Alexander rooms (“Do you remember how much he loved that bust?”), they went and visited the Natural History Museum for the first time in a long while. They tended not to favour it, as they found it hard to remember which of the displays showed animals that had really existed and which were just jokes the Almighty had laid. They stand in front of an exhibit showing the cast of a Megatherium skeleton and try to remember if giant sloths were a joke or not. 

“They’ve got to be right? Giant sloth? That just sounds stupid, doesn’t it? Have you ever seen a sloth? That but giant? Ludicrous.”

“Yes, of course, I have, it just seems a bit well…broad for a joke, my dear,” Aziraphale reasons. “Dinosaurs were a very complex, very well thought out, and frankly, for the want of a better word, ‘cool’ idea to fake. I don’t know if the same could be said of faking fossils of a sloth.”

“So, your stance is that they definitely existed because it's too ridiculous an idea to be made up?” Crowley asks incredulously. 

“Yes, well it does lack a certain style, and it’s not like you or I spent much time in South America, did we? They might have been quite a common feature,” Aziraphale says, as if he’s being completely reasonable. 

“Yeah, no, sorry. Definitely a joke, angel." 

"Oh, so gorillas nesting was plausible, but this isn't?" Aziraphale replies archly. 

"You're not going to let that go, were you? I'm sorry you were wrong for once. I mean, look at the dates!” Crowley says, gesticulating at the interpretation board in front of the sloth.

“If they’ve predated some sloth skeletons from 7000 BP, then that math works out for actually existing when the world had been created,” Aziraphale says, pointing to the dates on the board. 

“Yes, but that doesn’t account for the 10500 BP remains, does it?” Crowley argues back, pointing emphatically at the older date. 

“Maybe they’re just not very good at dating things?” Aziraphale refused to be wrong, and Crowley couldn’t help but laugh fondly at how ridiculous he was being. 

“Yeah, alright, angel. Maybe we should nip across to the V&A?”

This trip to the Natural History Museum will do them for a while, Crowley thinks. They cut it short to visit the V&A across the road. Crowley had suggested the Science Museum, but Aziraphale shot that idea down with a look. 

They went and appreciated the collection of plaster casts on the bottom floor and couldn’t help but reminisce when they got to a cast of Michelangelo's David. They’d both met him a few times while they were all being hosted by Lorenzo de’ Medici, which was how they’d gotten introduced to Leonardo Da Vinci as well. 

"You know I never told Leonardo this,” Aziraphale tells him conspiratorially as they round the corner into the Korea Gallery, “but I did always prefer the sketch you had to the painted picture. It looked far more like dear Gioconda." 

"Oh, no, yeah. Leo agreed, actually." 

"Oh, really? Didn't know that. I say, whatever happened to that picture of us he did? It was jolly good." 

" I might have it knocking about somewhere, actually." If by knocking around he meant carefully wrapped up and stored in a safe place. 

"I do miss Florence. We should go back sometime," Aziraphale says fondly. 

"It has been a while since I've seen the Boboli gardens," Crowley agrees, smiling at Aziraphale. 

"Which were they again? The ones in the Palazzo Pitti?"

"Yeah, that's right, had that fountain with Neptune in the courtyard before you go in."

"Oh, I always rather liked the one across from it, the Bardini was it? Had such a wonderful view of the city. I remember back when it was a private garden, I watched them construct the Duomo from there...Oh, I do like this vase. You know, I’ve never been to Korea.” 

“No, me neither.” 

“Oh, could we go for Korean BBQ after?” Aziraphale asks. As if Crowley will ever say no. 

*

[ ](Squashbee%20)

*

"I love you," he says, and it's not as dramatic as he thought it would be. It's freeing in its own way, but there's no falling fish from the sky, there are no ring roads ablaze, and as life and death as this kind of thing can seem, it is—in the grand scheme of mortal stakes—pretty low ranking. Though the shocked look Aziraphale gives Crowley certainly added to the drama. 

Now, Crowley wasn't sure what he was expecting. In an ideal scenario, Aziraphale would sigh dreamily and tell Crowley, “Of course I love you too, my dear boy.” The realistic scenario, with Aziraphale being Aziraphale, would be something rather more oblivious, anxious and maybe a little bastard-y. 

It didn't matter too much. They’re together now, an item, so he doesn't need to fear Aziraphale blessing him and never speaking to him again, right? The worst-case scenario was that he doesn't say it back, and that's fine, really. Dandy. 

"Oh Crowley," Aziraphale replies, and sure enough there is a sad, anxious edge to his voice. "Oh Crowley, you can't." 

This was not exactly how Crowley had imagined his response. 

"What do you mean I can’t?" Crowley asks, annunciating each word carefully, trying not to let his temper flare before he knew exactly what Aziraphale meant. 

"Well, I'd know." 

“You’d know?" Crowley laughs, and it sounds harsh even to his own ears. But the fact that Aziraphale thinks he would know anything about how Crowley feels about him after soundly ignoring it for six millennia—well, it's the least hilarious joke Crowley had ever heard. 

"This is nothing to laugh about," Aziraphale says angrily, his bright eyes shining with tears. As if he's the injured party here. As if it were him, not Crowley, who had just bared his heart and been told in return there's nothing there worth baring. 

“No, not it’s not,” Crowley says, collecting his sunglasses. He looks sadly at Aziraphale—and fuck, the look on his face makes Crowley ache—before turning around abruptly. “See you around, angel,” he says as he makes his way to the shop’s exit. 

“Crowley!” Aziraphale shouts after him, but Crowley resolutely picks up the pace before he feels himself give in, making sure the door slams loudly behind him. 

*

Crowley had spent millennia not living in Aziraphale's pocket. He'd spent centuries without seeing him. He had, in fact, somehow existed before he even knew that Aziraphale existed. He's been telling himself these facts for weeks now, hoping it'll soothe the jagged ache of missing him. It hasn't really worked so far. 

He lounges on his throne and stares through the whiskey in his tumbler. He wonders what Aziraphale is up to right now—if he's missing Crowley as badly as Crowley is missing him. If he’s even thought of Crowley. 

He downs the glass and then miracles it full again. He was just fine without Aziraphale, he tells himself, as if he doesn't know that he will eventually fold and go crawling back. Creeping, crawling, Crawley. He could try and change it, but maybe he will always be the loveless fallen creature twisting at better people's feet trying to tempt them down to his level. 

Fuck, he wanted a cigarette. He wanted to be a lot more drunk than he was now. He wanted to sleep for 100 years. He wanted to just not exist for just a moment—just a break from the creeping endlessness of eternity. He's put off sleep in the hope that Aziraphale would try and call or visit, but it's been long enough now for Crowley to realise it was a vain hope. 

He empties his glass again and makes his way to the bedroom, his jeans and waistcoat turning into black silken pyjamas as he walks. This probably isn't anything a good sleep can’t fix anyway. 

*

When Crowley wakes up, he wishes he’d made a note of the date he’d gone to sleep because he has no idea how long he’s been out. It’s still the same calendar month he remembers it being, but really it could be anything from a few days to a couple of weeks. He makes himself get up, gets changed and miracles up a cup of coffee before he lets himself check his phone. 

No missed calls. 

Crowley sighs. It’s not like they could spend the rest of eternity ignoring each other. Someone had to make the first move, and Crowley’s not surprised it turns out to be him. He gives his plants a once over with a threatening look in his eyes before exiting the flat and getting in his Bentley to go to the bookshop. 

When he gets there, he doesn't know what to do. Normally, he’d just let himself in, enjoying whichever variant of “We’re closed” Aziraphale would call out before realising it was Crowley. Now it doesn’t feel right to just waltz in, so he decides to knock and hopes Aziraphale won’t assume he’s someone foolish enough to try and buy a book from this bookshop and ignore him. 

Luckily, the door eeks open a crack, Aziraphale peering out suspiciously before brightening upon noticing it’s Crowley. He quickly sobers, likely at the grim look on Crowley’s face. “You’d better come in.” 

Crowley walks in and stands in the middle of the shop. Aziraphale joins him, the two facing each other in silence for a moment before speaking at the same time. 

“Aziraphale—”

“I’m so—” Crowley stops and holds his hand up to indicate “Carry on”. 

“I was just going to say that I’m so glad to see you. I wasn’t sure when you’d be back.” 

“You could have called, maybe popped ‘round yourself?” 

“You were the one who stormed out. I thought you would want to be—that you’d—well, at any rate, you could have called me too, you know?”

“I’m not the one who…” Crowley starts angrily but trails off, not knowing what to say. 

“Look, Crowley…” Aziraphale says into the pause. 

“Just forget it, angel, it’s—” Crowley stops because it’s not fine. Not really. But he’ll take it. He doesn’t want to hear what Aziraphale will say. 

“No please, I’d like you to understand,” Aziraphale says imploringly, and well, when had Crowley ever been able to say no? Crowley holds his palms out as if to say “Go on then.” 

"Well, I'd be able to feel it, my dear boy.” 

"Feel it?" Crowley asks sceptically. 

“Yes, angels could feel love my dear, and well…” Crowley raises his eyebrow at Aziraphale’s next line, “I can’t feel it.” 

“Feel it? I begged you to run away into the stars with me! I stopped time and transported us to an alternate plane of reality because that’s what you needed from me! I’ve walked on consecrated ground for you. What the fuck else do I need to do, Aziraphale?” 

He had meant to sound angry, furious even, but he can hear the desperate edge to his voice. He has done what he could to give Aziraphale whatever he would like, but yet somehow, he still ended up short. 

Aziraphale made a distressed sound and pulled Crowley into a hug. Crowley doesn’t hug back, but he can admit to himself that it was nice to be held.

“There was absolutely nothing you have or haven’t done to make think you don’t care about me deeply. Please don’t think that I...you’ve been so good to me for so many centuries. Please don’t think I haven’t noticed or that I don’t... appreciate it. Appreciate you.” 

If Crowley were crying, he might have sniffed a little here, but obviously, as a demon, he was not. He simply put his arms around Aziraphale, and they stood there, holding each other for a moment before Aziraphale pulled away and offered to put the kettle on. 

Just like that, back to normal. 

Just the same. 

  
  


* 

It is dark when Crowley wakes up. He checks the time on his phone, and it’s 2:11 in the morning. Aziraphale is no longer in bed, his side gone cold. Crowley rolls out of bed and makes his way down to the ground floor of the bookshop where he knows he’ll find Aziraphale nearly doubled over a misprint bible or something else ridiculous and endearing to collect. 

"What are you reading?" The book Aziraphale holds is suspiciously modern looking for him to be reading it so intently. 

Aziraphale startles at Crowley’s voice. "Oh, nothing. It's just a psychology book..." he trails off, poorly feigning nonchalance.

"Since when have you been interested in psychology?"

"Since..." Aziraphale's voice could pack an amazing amount of distress into one word. There are suddenly tears lining his eyes, and Crowley is suddenly very out of his depth. He’s still in his pyjamas. "I just thought it'd help." 

"Help what exactly?" Crowley asks wearily. 

"Help us!" Aziraphale exclaims. "It's just, I've been reading books about relationships and how healthy ones were built, and we've never experienced that! We've just had our sides and She knew that none of that was healthy, and things like that had effects and I just, I don't know..." He trails off again and takes a deep calming breath before speaking much more calmly. "I want to do this correctly, and right now I don't know if I know how." 

Crowley's eyes start watering of their own accord as he is struck by a bone-deep surge of utter adoration for the creature in front of him. The creature who doesn't do anything by halves, who, in the face of insecurity and uncertainty, starts a research project and is just as desperately afraid of doing this wrong as Crowley is. 

He doesn't know what to say and knows that if he tried, he’d just make some ridiculous noise that gets stuck in his throat. So he doesn’t. He goes to Aziraphale and wraps his arms around him where he sat at his desk. He kisses him softly on the top of his head. 

He waits until he's collected himself enough to ask with feigned nonchalance, "So have you found anything useful in this book, then?"

"I haven't got to the chapter about angel and demon love affairs yet," Aziraphale replies, still sounding so forlorn that Crowley almost misses the joke. He laughs. 

"You're a bastard, and I love you.” He kisses Aziraphale on the head again and tries to stop the tears in his eyes from falling. This was not very demonic of him. 

“Yes, you do,” Aziraphale says in almost wonderment, and it was fine that he didn’t say it back. Love isn’t a reciprocal transaction by nature; it doesn’t need to be taken to be given. _That should have been in Corinthians_ , Crowley thinks, lips still resting on top of Aziraphale’s curls. _Somewhere between “Love is patient, love is kind” and “it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth.”_

*

Okay, yeah, Crowley has been distracted the past few days, he’ll admit it. Maybe he hadn’t been around as much as he could have been, but that was absolutely no excuse. He should not have to baby them for them to know how to behave. He told them as much, and they shivered in fear. 

“Do you think this is acceptable? Do you?” Their shaking did nothing but strengthen Crowley’s contempt. 

"You know dear, I don't think this was what people mean when they suggest talking to your plants." Crowley jumps. He had thought Aziraphale was still sat on his white leather sofa watching one of the few TV programmes he found acceptable, the BBC’s 1995 production of _Pride and Prejudice_.

"What would you know about horticulture, angel? You miracled the Dowling's estate for five years, and that’s as close to plant care as you’ve ever gotten." 

"Be that as it may," he replies primly, "I'm quite sure you're supposed to speak kindly to them. Show them encouragement."

"Encouragement? Like what? ‘Buck up, Philodendron hederaceum’?"

"Oh, is that what these were called? They're lovely," Aziraphale says, leaning into them as he says “lovely”. The plants shiver in something far more akin to pleasure than fear. 

"No, stop that! You’ll give them the wrong idea."

"The wrong idea? Now, Crowley, dear, I'm sure they're trying their best." 

"Their best? Well, their best isn't good enough. Clearly," he says, brandishing his Sainsburys’ plant mister menacingly at a patch of missing leaves. 

“Well, if it is their best, shouting at them won't make them do any better, surely? You're punishing them for not meeting a standard that they simply cannot achieve, no matter how hard they try. Hardly seems fair, dear." 

"No, stop. Stop...empathizing with my plants!" Crowley exclaims, still brandishing the mister and accidentally setting it off as he gesticulated wildly. It showers him and Aziraphale in a very fine mist. 

They both stop. Aziraphale blinks slowly, his mouth set in an unimpressed line, and by the time his eyes open the two of them are dry again. He seems to deign it beneath him to acknowledge the shower and continues, “They want so much to please you, and I don’t think it’s fair to just cast them aside for just one…” Aziraphale trails off, eyes going wide as if he’s just had an epiphany. 

“No,” Crowley says carefully. They were not getting into this. “No, stop. Stop empathizing with…me. This isn’t—they’re plants. That’s it.” 

And that probably was it, right? He’s given these plants plenty of warnings, plenty of chances. Way more than he ever had. 

“Well, maybe you could be a little kinder to them? I shouldn’t like to live where there was shouting—not, of course, that I live here, obviously...” 

They looked at each other, and they both knew what the other was thinking. A break from London had been on the cards for a while now, and how else would they do it but together? Sure, Aziraphale doesn’t live with these plants now, but he would at some point, right? 

“... but one day you and these plants might be cohabiting?” Crowley ventures. 

Aziraphale brightens. “Yes, of course!” 

If it had been a human relationship, they would be going sort of fast. But after 6000 years of knowing each other, Crowley thought that now was just as good a time as any other. 

“Let’s get a house together, angel. Somewhere nice and quiet outside of London. Just you and me and the four people who live in the village who I won’t like and who you’ll try and get on with. What do you say?” 

This was not the first time Crowley has asked Aziraphale to come away with him. Admittedly, it’s to somewhere like the South Coast rather than Alpha Centauri, but the memories of rejection linger. 

Aziraphale’s smile is brighter than the sun on this planet or any other, and Crowley’s worries melt away as he exclaims, “Of course, dear. Anywhere you want to go.” 

  
  


*

In hindsight, it was naïve of Crowley to think that getting Aziraphale to pack up his bookshop would be anything other than extremely painful. 

“I could do it in a click of my fingers, angel,” Crowley pleads, not for the first time. 

"Oh, I just think I'd prefer to do it by hand," says Aziraphale, fiddling anxiously. 

"What, all of them? There are thousands! You wouldn't have hands left at the end of it, angel," Crowley tries to reason, yet again. 

"Not all of them, dear boy. Just the really special ones. You know, to make sure they're packed properly."

"We don't have to pack at all. We could just miracle it all there," Crowley points out, knowing it’s useless. 

"Oh," Aziraphale fusses, "I shouldn't like to risk it." 

"You once miracled our safety in surviving a bomb, but you can't trust yourself to miracle some books a few miles?"

"It's hardly a few miles, dear. And if you remember, it wasn't me who saved the books last time," replies Aziraphale wryly. 

Crowley grins. "Good point." 

"And anyway," Aziraphale continues excitedly, "I've been researching archival grade acid-free paper and boxes and everything else you need for safe storage and movement." 

"Well, I'd hate to waste that worthwhile investment of time," Crowley replies dryly before asking, “Are they stored in acid-free boxes now? Or, you know, stored in anything but wonky piles?"

"Well, not quite, no. But it could be a new start with the new house. I’ve done all kinds of reading. Did you know there’s a whole debate about whether you should wear gloves or not when handling books?" Aziraphale tells him, and no, Crowley hasn’t. 

Suddenly, Aziraphale’s eyes widen with glee. "It could be like a proper library. I could have index cards!" 

"Do libraries still use index cards? It's probably all on computers now, right?"

"Yes, well..." Aziraphale wilts a little, and Crowley absolutely could not stand to be the reason, not now when everything was going so well. 

"So, it stands to reason,” he continues, “that you could probably get some lovely vintage index card cabinets for a very fair price."

"Oh, that's a good point!" Aziraphale says, perking up again, and Crowley felt such a deep fondness he didn't think should be possible for a demon. He couldn't even bring himself to point out that only Aziraphale would ever use the index cards. At least writing them out will keep him occupied and hopefully content?

And he won't suddenly change his mind and decide that everything was going too fast? 

Hopefully? 

Yeah, exactly. 

“Are you okay, dear?” Aziraphale asks, and Crowley internally curses that his inner monologue has been playing out on his face. He’d probably been doing something stupid with his mouth as he thought.

“Yeah, of course, angel,” he replies breezily. In the past, Crowley had thought his faux nonchalance well-honed and believable. Right now, it sounds brittle even to his own ears. 

Aziraphale fixes him with a look, and yeah, okay, Crowley was not being fair here. He realised this. He couldn’t ask for honest and open communication and then not provide any honest and open communication himself. He really does understand that, but damn it, sometimes you just want to insecurely stew in your own entirely self-imagined problems, right? He took a deep breath and steeled himself, honest and open. Right. 

“Right, so I—” Aziraphale was looking at him so patiently and so calmly that Crowley sort of wanted to kiss him, kind of wanted to annoy the patience right out of him. He does neither because making this thing work is more important than the horrifying five minutes of vulnerability.

“This isn’t too fast?” 

“What isn’t too fast, dear?”

“All this?” He gestures around them. “You’re not—you’re not going to change your mind?” 

"Change my mind? Crowley, I’ve started packing my books!" he exclaims, as if that is indisputable proof of his commitment. And if it were for anyone, it would be Aziraphale, and Crowley loves him so much he can feel the weight of it physically settling in his stomach.

"Crowley, those books have been in the shop for over 200 years!" The slightly desperate edge to Aziraphale’s voice reminds Crowley of him trying to defend his declaration of love to Aziraphale, and yeah, okay, maybe he has not been giving Aziraphale the credit he deserves in his openness and readiness to both move in together and move on together. 

  
  


*

Crowley heard the door open, followed by the getting ever more familiar sounds of Aziraphale coming home. The shuffle of a coat being taken off and hung up, the putting away of outdoor shoes to be swapped for slippers. 

"Hey, angel," he calls from the kitchen table, where he'd been reading composting tips from a gardening blog on his phone. 

"Hello, my dear," Aziraphale replies from the hallway before walking into the kitchen, proudly holding a large Tupperware aloft. 

"The next-door neighbours, Crowley," Aziraphale begins and thrusts forward the Tupperware. "They're lesbians," he says with absolute delight. 

"Lesbians who bake, I presume," Crowley asks, nodding to the box where he could make out something sponge-like through the plastic. 

Aziraphale opens the Tupperware to reveal a rather nice-looking Victoria sponge. "Lesbians who bake," Aziraphale says, as if they've struck gold, and to be fair this has got to be close, in the neighbours’ department at least, to just that. 

Angels and demons were genderless, sexless and without any particular orientation, but like in a meme he'd once seen, there was something about the queer community which had always made Crowley, and Aziraphale for that matter, feel “[Same hat](https://imgur.com/gallery/uidF2VN)!” 

Crowley had assumed the countryside would be filled with people boring, small-minded and old enough to give Crowley and Aziraphale a run for their money. People who would think Aziraphale and Crowley the greatest gossip to come to the place for years, as it were, considering the absolutely tiny population of the village—more of a hamlet really. It seemed to have a proportionally large queer community now with the four of them. 

He might actually have to befriend them just to be seen together by all the old men who would shake their heads and say that the village was “going to the dogs”. 

*

It's very...domestic. They’ve really fallen into a routine, into an everyday life they have made together. Crowley has taken to doing the crossword in _The Guardian_ and was in a terse competition with next door to be able to text “Finished” first, starting as soon as Crowley saw the post person deliver the post and paper straight into next-door neighbour’s hands. 

Aziraphale asks how they both know the other isn’t cheating by “doing the googling” or something to that effect, and Crowley has to explain that it was an honour system, which would bring shame on them and their family if they weren’t honest with another. At least that’s how the longhaired lesbian had explained it to him. 

“You don’t have a family, dear.”

“I have you,” he replies and hadn’t really thought it a particularly weighty thing to say, but Aziraphale’s expression was so love-stricken Crowley had to look away. But the knowledge of the tears brimming in Aziraphale’s eyes still distracted him from seven down: _Italian musical term indicating a piece may be performed at the player’s preferred tempo (1,7)._

“Of course you do,” he replies sunnily, if still a little teary, and kisses Crowley on the top of his head. 

Aziraphale sat down to do his own crossword. He still does the crossword in _The Telegraph_ , and Crowley feels very smug when he’s able to get an answer that Aziraphale can’t. Crowley thought he might have preferred _The Guardian_ one, but he only really started doing it because the lesbians next door were, of course, _Guardian_ readers. 

Plus, having two papers in the house meant Crowley always had enough to compost. Perfect for their garden, where Crowley has barely had to raise his voice to the plants who were healthy and blooming and blossoming in their new home. 

*

It had only been a year since they averted the Apocalypse—okay since they were there when the Apocalypse was averted—and everything had changed so much. This nameless thing they had together was now named. They were in love and making their way in the world together. 

It’s not that hard really when it comes down to it. They just had to be honest: honest with themselves and each other. And everything else?

Everything else just falls into place.

  
  


**Author's Note:**

> This is the first fic I've finished in about ten years, so yeah.


End file.
